Acute water crisis in south Kolkata

With the Durga puja festivities beginning today, south Kolkata was hit by a water crisis with a shortage of 90 million gallons as six of the eight pumps at the Garden Reach Waterworks went out of order.

With the Durga puja festivities beginning on Wednesday, south Kolkata was hit by a water crisis with a shortage of 90 million gallons as six of the eight pumps at the Garden Reach Waterworks went out of order.

Long queues were found before tubewells in Tollygunge, Behala, Jadavpore and Garden reach areas as a result.

With 90 per cent of the water in south Kolkata being supplied by Garden Reach, Trinamool Congress-run Kolkata Municipal Corporation Mayor Sovan Chatterjee immediately suspected a 'conspiracy'.

He said that he would again urge the Left Front government to hand over the management of Garden Reach Waterworks to the civic body.

"We have already given Rs five crore to the state-run Kolkata Metropolitan Water and Sanitation authority, which operates the Garden Reach Waterworks, for immediate repair of three pumps which earlier turned idle," he said. The Mayor said that the municipal commissioner had asked a senior official of the water department to repair the defective pumps on an emergency basis if the state government failed to act in time.